


viral (gone wrong) (gone awkward)

by k0re_c



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Aang (Avatar) Is Not The Avatar, Anxiety, Bending (Avatar), Bisexual Sokka (Avatar), Canonical Child Abuse, Dog Appa (Avatar), Everyone Has Issues, F/F, F/M, Gay Zuko (Avatar), Hilarity Ensues, M/M, Ozai (Avatar) Being a Terrible Parent, Ozai (Avatar) is an Asshole, Partially Blind Zuko (Avatar), Partially Deaf Zuko (Avatar), Past Sokka/Suki (Avatar), Past Sokka/Yue (Avatar), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Protective Sokka (Avatar), Repression, Sokka (Avatar) Has ADHD, They're okay though, Toph Beifong and Zuko are Siblings, Trauma, YouTube, Youtuber AU, Zuko is a Theatre Kid, aang also has adhd, aang is a vegan mukbanger, all my homies hate ozai, appa is aang's emotional support animal, azula shows up later, i mean it's zuko so obviously, sokka is a gamer, the au nobody asked for, there is no avatar, this au is my entire life, toph demands accessible games, zuko is a faceless youtuber
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-21
Updated: 2020-12-28
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:15:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28211487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/k0re_c/pseuds/k0re_c
Summary: Working as a full time YouTuber is an exciting and difficult job. Sokka thinks his career has reached its peak when he and his closest friends are all working as successful content creators.Then, he meets the faceless Blue Spirit, and his embarrassing crush complicates things.AKA sokka is a gaming youtuber who has a raging crush on zuko despite never seeing him
Relationships: Aang/Katara (Avatar), Sokka/Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 19
Kudos: 176





	1. chapter one

**Author's Note:**

> so this au has been stirring in my brain and here it is. pure chaos  
> im really bad at starting stories out because i get excited about my ideas but i did my best lol.  
> enjoy :)  
> this world might be a little confusing rn but im not gonna drop all the worldbuilding in the first chapter lmao

**@BoomerangBoy**  
_New video coming tonight.. Phasmophobia ft. the Blind Bandit, AangsAarows, and fangirlsuki! This game is horribly inaccessible but we did the best we could lmao._

Sokka stared down at his phone, watching the Twitter notifications roll in as his fans celebrated the collab he announced. The four of them hadn’t made a video together in a couple months, and it was always a good way for them all to get a boost in their views. 

He’d been making videos since he was 16, and started out recording comedy skits on his iPhone 6. When he was 19, his modest 3000 subscriber count blew up when a bald vegan mukbanger that lived near him and Katara’s apartment in Ba Sing Se asked him to collab. Although he had never watched the kid’s content, he’d seen his face on countless reaction images and found it hard to say no when he saw the seven digit subscriber count. After that, he was introduced to the kid’s roommates, Toph and Suki, who were also well known creators, and the rest was history. 

“Sokka,” said Katara sternly, interrupting his hyperfocus on his phone, “eat your dinner, please.”

Sokka rolled his eyes and made a big show of taking another bite of his noodles, slurping loudly and causing everyone at the table to groan in disgust. 

He spared one last glance at his phone, completely ready to shut it off before one notification caused him to freeze mid-chew.

**The Blue Spirit liked your Tweet**

“Tui and La, Sokka,” Suki groaned, rolling her eyes as Sokka buried his face in his arms and squealed all too dramatically.

Sokka flailed his arms and held up his phone for everyone to see, before exclaiming, “He LIKED my tweet!”

“You mean the Blue Spirit?” Aang asked, smiling encouragingly despite the irritated demeanor of the rest of his friends.

“Of course he means the Blue Spirit, he’s literally in love with the guy!” Toph shouted.  
“Toph,” Sokka said, suddenly serious, “Please. PLEASE invite him the next time we all play together. I’m literally begging you.”

“Oh, I see, you’re just using me to get to the Blue Spirit!” Toph exclaimed, pointing an accusatory finger in Sokka’s general direction.

Before Sokka could offer his rebuttal, Katara decided to take over the conversation as the voice of reason, “Sokka, you don’t even know what the guy looks like. How could you possibly have a crush on him?” 

“Well yeah, that’s what makes it so exciting,” Sokka says as if he was explaining the simplest thing in the world, “the mystery is what makes it hot! Not to mention the guy’s voice, spirits, Katara.” 

Katara didn’t even bother responding, simply turning back to her food and looking dumbfounded and slightly insulted. 

“Well, nobody knows what he looks like, Katara. That’s kind of the whole point of him being faceless.” Aang said, looking more than ready for the conversation to be over. 

“Okay, whatever, I don’t really care. I just think it’s really weird,” Katara said, giving Sokka a pointed look. 

He just stuck her tongue out at her before turning back to Toph, “So, anyway. Toph? Will you ask him?” 

Toph heaved a big sigh, replying, “I guess so, Sokka. But the guy’s pretty standoffish, and honestly he’s a little fucking weird.” 

Sokka just grinned, feeling completely starstruck as he realized he was finally going to meet his longest lasting internet crush. 

The conversation continued, but to Sokka, it was just background noise.


	2. chapter two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> someone help this boys.  
> perhaps a look into zuko's mysterious life is coming up next.

He just had to edit for two more hours. That’s just fifteen minutes, eight times. Then he could go to sleep at five, and get six hours of sleep for his scheduled stream at noon tomorrow. 

Sokka sighed, finishing off his second red bull of the night before deciding to resign himself to a fifteen minute break from the completely ridiculous Sims 4 100 baby challenge he’d been working on for the past hour and a half. As funny as he found himself, he was tired of listening to the sound of his own voice. He and Aang had gotten together for an editing night at Sokka and Katara’s apartment, where they were planning to pull an all-nighter and get a few weeks worth of content edited and finished so they could put all their focus on their streams, which had been raking in a lot of views lately.

It had been going great until Aang started editing a section of one of his mukbangs where he was telling a story about growing up in foster care and the one time he’d almost gotten adopted. It was kind of a sore spot, and Sokka had never learned the whole story. He assumed Katara knew her own boyfriend’s history but he didn’t want to ask because as much as he wanted to know, it was ultimately Aang’s story to tell. There was about a half hour of Aang crying into his emotional support dog, Appa’s, fur before he was asleep in Sokka’s bed. Now, a few hours later, both he and the dog were snoring and it was kind of adorable, so Sokka snapped a few pictures for future blackmail purposes. With his luck, though, it would just become another viral wholesome reaction image that would only further the entire internet’s love of the tattooed, bald headed vegan. 

Standing and stretching his muscles, sore from hours of sitting at his desk, Sokka flopped down on his bed next to his sleeping friend and scrolled mindlessly through Twitter for a few minutes, before a notification caught his eye.

**bluespirit started a live video on Instagram! Watch it before it ends!**

He’d never reacted to a notification faster in his life. 

He clicked the familiar profile picture of the blue mask and his phone filled with a black screen, along with the live’s title of “late night q&a :)” at the top. 

As he entered, he caught the end of the Blue Spirit’s explanation of the origin of the blue mask he used to identify himself. Of course, being a true fan and having caught it in a video on his channel before, Sokka already knew that it was from the guy’s favorite play and didn’t need to hear it again. Not that he didn’t love the sound of his voice, because he did. It was warm and raspy, and expressive despite being quiet. As quiet as he usually was, he was known to yell when he was passionate or pissed off, which honestly happened pretty often and almost exclusively about extremely mundane things. But the thing that Sokka liked most about the dude’s voice was the slight lisp that he spoke with, that was more prominent late at night or when he was speaking as the unedited version of himself in streams. 

_“Tui and La, I’m really analyzing his speech patterns,”_ Sokka couldn’t help but think to himself.

A few more personal questions appeared and disappeared as the Blue Spirit shuffled through and decided not to answer the more revealing ones, and eventually stopped on a simple “where are you from”

“Well, I was born in Caldera and mostly grew up there. But I’ve been living in Ba Sing Se since I was 16.”

Sokka’s heart dropped into his stomach and he barely stopped himself from screaming out loud at the knowledge that his faceless crush lived in the same city as him. He wouldn’t even let himself consider that he lived in the largest city in the Earth Kingdom and chances were they had never even passed each other in the street. 

“Agni, chat calm down. Why are people so surprised when they find out I’m Fire Nation? I just explained that my profile picture is from a famously Fire Nation play. You people need to learn your history,” he joked.

Sokka watched mindlessly as he went through a few more questions that he already knew the answers to. Maybe it was just because he was so tired, or the fact that he had consumed an inhuman amount of caffeine that day, but he felt bold enough to leave a question of his own. 

_“He probably won’t even read it,”_ he told himself to try to rationalize it, _“this will just get it out of your system.”_

So he typed it in the box, and hit send.

**Hey blue, wanna play some among us with me and team avatar tomorrow? We need one more to fill the lobby!**

Unfortunately, he had to wait a while to see if his question would be acknowledged, because someone had made the mistake of arguing that oolong tea was better than jasmine, and a nearly ten minute rant about the precision and care it took to properly brew jasmine followed, which led into an extremely endearing story in which he swore that his uncle was able to brew the concept of love into his jasmine tea. 

Eventually, after that story tapered off, Sokka anxiously watched, his heart doubling in speed when his own question appeared on the screen.

“Wait who asked this? Oh, it’s boomerang boy! Hello! I don’t have any streams planned tomorrow, um, yeah I can play a few games if you guys need me there. I’ll DM you when I end this.”

Sokka couldn’t hear the stream continuing over the sound of blood rushing in his ears. The Blue Spirit was going to slide into his DM’s, not the other way around. 

He tried to go back to editing, the butterflies in his stomach too intense to continue watching the live, but he couldn’t focus on that either, so he just sat and imagined what the message might say so he could formulate his response in advance. Before he could even think though, the notification popped up.

**@thebluespirit:** Hello! Thanks for inviting me to play with you guys, it’s so crazy that you even know who I am, I’m a big fan of you guys! What time are you planning to play tomorrow?

**@boomerangboy:** thank you so much! and seriously, we’re probably bigger fans of yours, you have no idea. but anyway we’re planning on playing around noon tomorrow, and you’re welcome to play for as long as you feel like!

The conversation continued for a few more minutes, during which Sokka invited the Blue Spirit to their discord server and let the rest of the gang know he would be joining them. Of course, nobody else answered because it was well after five in the morning, but that’s not the point. 

Finally, giddy beyond belief and completely exhausted, Sokka flopped down on his bed next to Aang and Appa, falling asleep and leaving his half edited video abandoned.


	3. chapter three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> surprise update two days in a row because i had inspiration to write

“Okay, your toast is your starch, peanut butter is protein and fat, and banana is your fruit. If you have a glass of milk you’ll have all the food groups covered for breakfast!” Katara said after analyzing Sokka’s plate.

“Katara we get it, you’re on your nutrition unit.” Sokka whined through a mouthful of food. 

“Be nice, Sokka!” Aang chided, wrapping his girlfriend in a forceful hug, “Katara’s gonna be the best nurse ever.” 

“Aang, don’t you have your own apartment that you need to be getting back to?” Sokka asked bitterly after Aang didn’t take his side.

Aang just pouted before stealing a banana slice off his plate and disappearing into the living room, where he was planning to hold his stream that day since he claims he didn’t feel like going home. Really, he was just obsessed with Katara and didn’t want to leave because he would miss her, but Sokka felt like it wasn’t quite his place to make any comments about that.

Sokka talked to himself as he set up for his stream, saying things out loud just so he felt more confident he wouldn’t forget them. He joined the discord call early and waited patiently for everyone he’d invited to the lobby to arrive.

Of course, Aang joined shortly after he did, but he was muted and was definitely making out with Katara in the living room. So, gross. 

Suki and Toph were next, followed by a couple girls Aang introduced to the gang, Ty Lee and Mai, who were instantly upon introduction subjected to one of Toph’s long(and completely valid) rants about the accessibility of online games to the blind and visually impaired community. 

“All I’m saying is that this damn game could include its own screen reader software instead of making me download a whole different fucking thing just to play a spaceship themed game of mafia!”

Right in the middle of Toph’s sentence, a ping was heard, followed by a familiar voice saying, “Damn, Toph, you’re still on about this?”

A collective groan filled the call, along with Toph’s pointed, “Shut the fuck up, Jet!”

An awkward silence followed, which wasn’t helped when Longshot, an exceptionally quiet and strategic streamer that Sokka occasionally played with, joined the call. 

“I’m just saying, you talk about it a lot,” Jet says, “I’m not trying to offend anyone.”

“I hope I get impostor so I can snap your fucking neck legally,” is Toph’s only response. 

“Okay, I’m gonna start the lobby up, the others should be here any minute,” Sokka interjected before the situation could get any more heated.  
He started a lobby, sending the code to discord before quickly taking the color blue before it could be stolen. The others filed in quickly, and when Teo joined they were only waiting on one other person.

“So are we gonna start, or just sit in the lobby?” Jet asked.

“We’re waiting on one more!” Aang said, far too cheerfully for how much Sokka knew he disliked the guy.

Finally, a ping was heard, followed by a hesitant, “Hello, everyone!”

“Wait, is that Blue?” Toph asked, “I didn’t invite him, how did you get here you little weirdo?”

“Oh, um,” he started, before he was interrupted.

“I invited him!” Sokka stated proudly, hoping his friends couldn’t hear how flustered he felt. 

“Well hello, Blue Spirit,” Jet said.

“Agni’s sake, is that Jet?” Blue exclaimed.

“Oooh, do you guys have beef?” Ty Lee asked, upbeat as ever. “It’ll make the game even more exciting!”

“You could say that,” Jet said, and Sokka could just about see his stupid fucking smirk through the screen. What an asshole. His appearances did bring drama, though, which brought views. 

“Anyway,” Blue said, “Toph, can I have black?”

“I don’t know what the fuck colors look like but sure.” she replied, somehow flawlessly walking toward the computer and changing her color.

“Toph, how did you suddenly know where to go?” Sokka asked.

“Oh, I have a secret weapon up my sleeve today,” she said.

“I’m not a secret!” an off-puttingly cheerful voice sang. 

“Tui and La is that fucking Joo Dee?” Sokka groaned. Joo Dee was technically Toph’s “personal assistant” as she liked to put it, but the lady was downright annoying, which Toph only seemed to find even more funny.

“Sokka, don’t be an ableist. I can’t play the game by myself. So, shut up and prepare to lose.” 

“Okay, whatever. I’m starting the game.” Sokka said, not feeling like validating what Toph said with a response.  
Sokka had decided that the group would be playing with proximity chat today, totally just because it was more popular right now and not because he wanted more time to talk to the Blue Spirit.

He followed Toph around for a while, and decided not to run straight to the button when he saw her hop in a vent because of her promise to kill Jet first. 

She did, and every single game for four in a row he was killed first. Then, when he wasn’t, he was ejected first because it was suspicious that he was still alive.

“That, my friends, is karma,” Sokka said dramatically as he watched Jet’s yellow spacesuit float off into the stars.

“Hell yeah it is,” the Blue Spirit agreed, and Sokka pretended not to notice the butterflies he got from being acknowledged by him. 

The next game, Teo got caught red handed by Suki killing Ty Lee in electrical and venting to medbay, and was promptly ejected. Everyone ran around doing their tasks, and Sokka decided to trail the Blue Spirit.

“Hey Blue, what’s up man?” he asked as casually as possible.

“Oh, uh, you know. Shooting asteroids.” he replied.

“Oh yeah, yeah me too. Just.. doing crewmate stuff.” 

“Awesome, Sokka, that doesn’t sound sus at all,” Blue said though a laugh, and Sokka nearly died at hearing his favorite voice say his name. 

The two ran around the ship completing tasks together, and after they were finished just ran around checking for dead bodies.

“Why is nobody dying?” Blue asked after their third run in with Suki and Mai. 

“Hold on. I think I know what’s going on,” Sokka said, leading Blue to the button and calling a meeting.

“Okay, has anyone seen Aang this round?” Sokka asked the group.

After everyone replied that they hadn’t seen him, he was even more confident in his theory.

“Okay. Aang is in a vent. He isn’t killing because he doesn’t believe in murder and he doesn’t care that it’s just a game.” 

“Again Aang?” Toph shouted, “A-fuckin-gain?”

“No I’m not,” Aang argued weakly, “I’m just doing tasks...and stuff.”  
“Okay, vote cyan then.” Jet said.

“No, fuck you.” Toph replied, “I’m voting Jet because I don’t like him.”

“Sounds good to me,” Mai said, completely monotone. 

The voting ended quickly, and again everyone watched Jet’s yellow suit float away.

“Um, so what now?” Suki asked.

“Aang, have you seriously never killed anyone?” asked the Blue Spirit incredulously. 

“No, it’s wrong!” Aang exclaimed with far too much passion.

“That means he’s never won an imposter game!” Blue shouted.

“I mean, I guess not.” Aang said.

“Aang, call reactor. We’ll all totally fix it, right guys? We won’t just let Aang win or anything,” Blue said.

“I don’t know, isn’t that technically still killing-” Aang started.

“Let’s do it.” Longshot said, his first words of the stream. 

As the screen flashed red and the defeat screen popped up, Sokka felt like his heart was tripling in size like the grinch.

“I won! Katara! I won!” Aang literally screamed.

“Can we not take the game seriously?” Jet sneered.

“Jet just be thankful we didn’t eject your ass first that time.” Toph said.

The group played for a few hours, and had a much better time after Jet left with a lame excuse and Haru filled his spot. 

About a half hour after Sokka ended his stream, his phone lit up with a notification.

 **@thebluespirit:** Hey Sokka, thanks for inviting me to play today! I had a really good time. Especially after Jet left, lol, what an asshole. Let me know if you ever need a spot filled again!

Sokka was so thrown off by the excessively cute message that he didn’t even have time to be embarrassed about lying that he needed a spot filled just to get the guy to play with him. 

**@boomerangboy:** no problem dude, we were glad to have you! after today you might have to become jet’s full time replacement. also im sorry i didn’t realize you two knew each other, i probably should have asked. 

**@thebluespirit:** Agni, he and I go way back, unfortunately. I’ll have to tell you about it one day. And honestly, I’m more than down, that game is crazy popular right now and I’ve been looking for excuses to post it.

He nearly died at what was basically a promise from the Blue Spirit that they would be talking again.

 **@boomerangboy:** we’re planning to play again on tuesday night if you’re free?

 **@thebluespirit:** I’ll be there :)


	4. chapter four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> shut the fuck up, jet

Katara had been talking to Sokka for probably ten minutes, but he hadn’t heard a single word of it as he stared down at his phone, specifically at two missed calls and a single unanswered text, all from the same person.

**Jet:** We need to talk. Now.

Of course, his mind went right to the worst case scenarios, and he pictured Jet being pissed off and doxxing him and Katara. They would have to relocate, forward their mail. It wouldn’t be cheap. 

“Sokka? Are you even listening to me?”

He snapped his head up, and she just rolled her eyes and walked off. He felt a little bad, she could have been talking about something important, but he was a little occupied!

**Sokka:** okay, i guess. what do you want

Less than a minute later, his phone was buzzing with an incoming call. His screen lit up with an old picture of Jet from when he had been good friends with the gang. Jet had gotten really focused on numbers, and jealousy and competitiveness drove him apart from most of his friends. 

“Hello?” he answered after letting it ring for a while out of nervousness.

“Sokka. We need to talk.” Jet answered.

“Yeah, I kind of got that part Jet. What do you want?”

“I see you’re all buddy-buddy with this Blue Spirit guy all the sudden.” he said, sounding almost bitter.

“Jet, he was in one stream with me.” Sokka replied, already beyond done with this conversation.

“Look, I’m just trying to warn you, as a friend. The dude’s got major issues, Sokka. He and I have a… history.” 

“So I’ve heard.”

“Oh, so he talked about me? Let me guess, he’s playing the fucking victim?” 

“Tui and La, Jet, please relax. He just mentioned that something happened between you guys in the past. I didn’t pry.” Sokka spoke calmly, trying to bring Jet out of his blind rage.

“It wasn’t just a little _twitter dot com_ drama, Sokka. I met him. I know his name, it’s Lee. But he freaked out and ended everything out of nowhere and completely ghosted me, and I went to his place to try and confront him and he damn near called the cops on me, and don’t even get me started on the fucking daddy issues. Also-” Sokka cut him off before he could finish.

“Jet, what the fuck. He keeps that shit private for a reason.” Sokka said, feeling overwhelmed with the information, “I don’t understand why you’re telling me this. Were you guys a couple or something?” 

“No, you know I don’t do relationships like that. I fucked him a couple times. But like I said, he freaked out. Dude’s got some internalized homophobia. He’s sick in the head, Sokka.” Jet rambled on, sounding more unhinged than Sokka had ever heard him.

“I’m not talking about this anymore. Find a new group to stream with until you get this worked out.” he said, hanging up before Jet had the chance to reply. 

He sat there for a while to take in everything that had just happened, unsure on what he was supposed to do with what he had just learned. Acting completely on impulse, he eventually decided to DM The Blue- well, Lee, and give him an abridged version of what Jet had told him.

**@boomerangboy:** hey, blue. i just wanted to let you know that jet just called me and unloaded a bunch of shit on me. i don’t know how much was even true but i just thought it wouldn’t be fair if you didn’t know that i knew stuff about you. he told me your name, and im really sorry because i know your privacy is a big deal to you. 

**@thebluespirit:** Okay, thank you for telling me. I’m really sorry you had to deal with this. Also, don’t feel bad. Lee isn’t even my real name. I may have been naive but I wasn’t stupid enough to tell him my real name. 

**@boomerangboy:** whoa, don’t apologize. i know how intense jet can be. i think he’s just jealous or something. he can be really possessive.

**@thebluespirit:** Yeah, tell me about it. 

Sokka watched Blue’s typing bubble appear and disappear for a few minutes before he finally finished his response. 

**@thebluespirit:** Please don’t tell anyone about this. I don’t care about my stupid fake name and stuff but I’m really not ready for everyone to know that I like guys yet.

Sokka literally felt his heart squeeze in his chest as he typed up the quickest response of his life.

**@boomerangboy:** i wouldn’t dream of telling anyone. that’s for you to tell people when you’re ready. im willing to beat jet’s ass for outing you to me.

He thought for a moment before typing up a second sentence

**@boomerangboy:** but seriously, the gang would never judge you for that. the only straight person in the whole group is katara, and even that’s debatable. 

**@thebluespirit:** Thank you so much for understanding. I know that you guys wouldn’t care, I just have a lot of issues with myself, I guess. 

**@boomerangboy:** that’s okay! also, just so you know, jet is officially banned from the gang’s streams until further notice. i dont think ive been this pissed at someone in a long time.

**@thebluespirit:** Well maybe we’ll actually have a peaceful game this Tuesday then, lol

As the conversation shifted away from the morning’s incident, Sokka finally let himself react to the information he got today. The Blue Spirit wasn’t straight. He actually had a chance with this awkward theatre kid who had fucking auto-caps on, and he didn’t even know what he looked like. 

A long night of conversation and games of 8-ball later, Sokka and the Blue Spirit each sent out an identical tweet, that simply read “Shut the fuck up Jet”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading :) any feedback is appreciated!
> 
> if you're looking for something else to read, my friend mrooke has two stories that i'm completely obsessed with right now, so check them out!!
> 
> <3


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